It's not a lack
of any respect, Howard--quite the contrary; but these honest people
down here pick up all sorts of gossip--in a quiet life, you know, a
little gossip goes a long way; and even my good maids are human--I
should be so in their place! Howard, a bit of this chicken--our own
chickens, our own vegetables, our country cider--everything home-
grown; and now to business, and we will settle Master Jack in a
turn. My own belief is, in choosing a profession, to think of all
possibilities and eliminate them one by one."
"Yes," said Howard, "but we are met by this initial difficulty;
that one might settle a dozen professions for Jack, and there is
not the smallest guarantee that he would choose any of them. I
think he will take his own line. I never knew anyone who knew so
definitely what he intended to do, and what he did not intend to
do!"
"You have hit it," said the Vicar, "and I do not think you could
have said anything which could please me more. He is independent;
it is my own temperament over again! You will forgive a touch of
vanity, Howard, but that is me all over. And that simplifies our
plan of action very considerably, you know!"
"Yes," said Howard, "it undoubtedly does. I have no doubt from what
Jack told me that he intends to make money. It isn't, in him, just
the vague desire to have the command of money, which most young men
have. I have to talk over their careers with a good many young men,
and it generally ends in their saying they would like a
secretaryship, which would give them interesting work and long
holidays and the command of much of their time, and lead on to
something better, with a prospect of early retirement on a
pension.
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